the Complexion Connexion

Free Sofware developers -- in their daily focus -- are commited to making the software GOOD. Free Software companies -- according to their own moral imparative -- are commited to making the software
USEFUL.

That the two objectives don't wholly overlap is a source of frisson
between Free Software individuals and the Free Software's corporate
sponsors. Maybe this is healthy in itself, or an opportunity waiting to
be leveraged.

Perhpas it's time for the Free Software community as a whole to
think about the role and value that Free Software companies bring to
the ecosystem.

"Software innovation, like almost every other kind of innovation,
requires the ability to collaborate and share ideas with other people,
and to sit down and talk with customers and get their feedback and
understand their needs."

This is a veiled criticism of Free Software. He's talking about his software business -- where he often conflates software technology assembly
with the organization of people in his business dedicated to solving
customers' problems and making alternatives look unattractive.

The quote is difficult to fault as a business statement, since they
have proven adept at doing the whole package. But it doesn't account
for the superior code produced by both isolated and collaborative work
across the Free Software ecosystem.

Mr Gates visualizes the Free Software developer -- the Hobbyist, for whom his distain is on record -- as an anti-social being (see in section, "Non-Assertion of Patents Pledge," the definition of "
Non-Compensated Individual Hobbyist Developer"),
having long hair, bad breath and working alone in a garret. He can't be
entirely wrong because he was a software hobbyist, himself, back in the
1970s -- closely fitting that description.

Free Software doesn't actually suffer from a lack of collaboration
on the code. It suffers in the market-place -- that bazaar of products
-- from an almost comprehensive lack of collaboration with business.

A few years ago, I thought it was an embarrassment that the
bellwether GNU/Linux company, Red Hat, had only passed the $100-million
total revenue mark. Given the size of the enterprise and consumer
software markets, that number was just ... well, embarrassing.

Just this week, we read with a mixture of amusement, glee and ennui
that Novell, having got its reporting methods checked off by the SEC,
reported 4th Quarter revenue from Open Platform Solutions (which
includes Linux) at $23 million, up 69% versus the year-ago quarter.

Even though Novell's Linuxinvoicings (something different
than accounting revenues) were up 108% in the period, suggesting an
annualized Linux billing-rate well beyond $100 million, it is fairly
depressing that the company with the very best enterprise GNU/Linux
desktop, plus some good identity, messaging and deployment/management
products makes as much money in one Quarter as Microsoft makes in a few
minutes.

Evidently, GNU/Linux's enterprise penetration today is so minimal
that it is hard sometimes to see why Microsoft bothers to oppose it.
(Or is it attributable to the monopoly's effectiveness in opposition?)
This means that GNU/Linux does not have a depth or breadth of
conversations under weigh with corporate IT departments -- the
innovative, feedback kind of conversations that Mr Gates rightly prizes.

How is this going to change if not slowly? Progress seems glacial
today in light of the Free Software community's apparent and general
disinterest in business and willingness to abuse
sincere, if controversial, efforts to compete. The small amount of
business in the commercial Free Software space makes it hard to attract
bright people. The space seems incompatible with innovation. (I'm not
convinced it's merely due to monopoly conditions.)

Experience working and solving enterprise customers' problems breeds
experience. Solutions as well as sales, deployment & integration
knowledge improve in a cumulative way.

I wrote last year in the Financial Times about the more prominent GNU/Linux migration case studies
in Europe: the Gendarmes, Munich and PSA Peugeot Citroen. PSA is a
Novell customer and the migration of 40% of that car company's desktops
to SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 is a pivotal case for Novell and
for the GNU/Linux desktop in general.

Christophe Therry, Novell general manager for France, explained:
"Peugeot was impressed with the translucent 3D desktop, with the
user-interface functionality and was looking for a way to facilitate
the path through the user-adoption curve."

Peugeot is a Lotus
Notes and SAP house; these enterprise applications must integrate
seamlessly. Peugeot and Novell convinced IBM to port Lotus Notes to
Linux (which IBM had no prior intention of doing), and this was
accomplished for Novell SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 in just two
months. (IBM and Novell are now cross-marketing Notes 8 on Novell's
SLED 10 Linux desktop.) Novell was able to feed back Peugeot's
requirements into SLED 10, for which Mr Therry credits Peugeot's
culture.

Working together they improved SLED 10's wireless
security making it possible, for example, for a laptop's connection to
move from one domain server to another while maintaining security.

They
improved Linux's ability to integrate securely in a Windows
environment; and added coding improvements to the Firefox browser on
Linux which make it possible for the internal websites to conform to
the exotic requirements of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser when
such pages are viewed on any platform.

Some
Free Software developers -- perhaps those operating from their garrets
-- may ask, "Why do we need to commercialize Linux? It's fine as it is.
It solves all my problems!" It's a fair question, for which
we need a fair answer. Even Linus Torvalds has commented about
virtualization, for example, 'I don't care ... I'm just not that
interested in it.' We are glad they are so focused on the problems that
are important to them; it has made the software GOOD.

Yet PSA Peugeot Citroen represents the kind of enterprise engagement
that is not only healthy for GNU/Linux but essential to making it USEFUL.
Through the engagement, key customer-recommended features get added or
adjusted within the software, and the collaboration with the end user
helps Novell address problems of integration or of interoperability
that are outside the GNU/Linux code-base (and therefore not typically
identified as problems). Thanks to the quality and the efficiency of
developer collaboration around the GNU/Linux code, the inside work on GNU/Linux is so advanced today that it is largely these outside problems which present the more significant obstacles to adoption.

Mr Gates is right about software innovation, but he's the wrong
person to say it. Enterprise engagement by commercial Free Software
companies is critical if GNU/Linux is to be useful as well as good. And
we need more of it.

"What we want is to be able to take advantage of technology advances
when they happen," Rubinow said. "We're trying to be as independent of
any technologies as we can be."

This is what I call "Zero Procurement"; it's about the customer deploying Free Software on his own schedule, and even taking on some of the cost of testing, configuration and integration.

The kinds of software problems IT vendors can usefully solve tend to be generic (universal or commodity problems). Whereas the kinds of software problems the heavy-compute buy-side can solve for themselves tend to differentiate their business.

It's an astute assessment by Pieter at FFII, in the aftermath of Neelie Kroes' capitulation to Microsoft ...

So, Microsoft has decided to bleed the GPL economy dry by:

Fragmenting the Linux economy by making patent deals with Linux vendors - TurboLinux, Xandros, and of course, Novell.

Starting a proxy-troll patent attack on Red Hat, the leading Linux
distributor (it has also attacked Novell but that is probably so that
it can ride to Novell's defense). Red Hat refused to make a deal, now
it will pay the price.

Splitting the open source community away from the free software community, by re-branding itself as an "open source" firm.

Announcing that it wants to buy open source firms. Money is the greatest divider ever.

Bringing open source projects into its franchise, where they will
get protection from Microsoft's patents, in return for using
Microsoft's open source licenses.

It's a desperate scheme, because it's guaranteed to backfire in the
worst possible way, and surely Microsoft cannot be naive enough to
think it'll work.

Here is how Microsoft's plan to kill the GPLv3 is going to backfire.

It's going to bring large numbers of people into the "no software
patents" camp. Up to now, it's not been clear to most people just how
damaging the EPO's practice of allowing software patents has been. The
FFII has been saying for a while, "software patents trump anti-trust"
but few have understood, until now.

It's going to end the license wars. Microsoft have set the stage
for a mass migration to, not away from, the GPLv3. Why? Because open
source projects that get too close to the beast will shrivel and die
like grapes on hot coals.

It's going to focus the wrath of an entire community against
Microsoft. For the last decade or so, Redmond have not really messed
with the FOSS world and the FOSS world has mostly ignored Redmond,
apart from a lot of taunting and name-calling. Now, that has changed.

The future of open source and free software will look like this:
first, Microsoft will pump money into its franchiseware economy and get
very little back. Second, IBM will do the same with its own
franchiseware economy (the Apache Foundation) and get a lot more back,
because IBM actually understand how this works. Last, all remaining
projects will move to the GPL, with a few exceptions. And it's that
economy, the one based on formal copyleft licenses, and backed by
increasing determination to litigate and defend against litigation,
that will prevail.

A made-up thing, a company called "IP Innovation LLC", is suing Red Hat & Novell for something which sounds like the virtual desktop implementation in Linux (which I personally treasure as a productivity godsend -- and which is enabled by Linux's true multi-threading, multi-tasking might...Windows can't implement virtual desktop because, underneath, Windows code is a complex tangle of spaghetti lacking in Linux's Unix-provenance as a real OS).

PJ & Company astutely make the connection that behind "IP Innovation LLC" is a group called Acacia which is staffed by senior Microsoft agents, including Jonathan Taub, a Microsoft Hero & Key Achiever.

The Microsoft Cross-Marketing & Interoperability Pact with Novell says that Microsoft and Novell pledge not to sue each other or each other's customers for ostensible patent infringements. "IP Innovation LLC" is a shadow Microsoft hitsquad. Therefore, Novell is aware now that Microsoft is in breach of their deal.

The drama continues and Linux keeps getting more important and easier to implement -- outside the USA.

CIOs -- this has become too transparent. Aren't you fed up yet?

ceteris parabis, this patent trolling by Microsoft is immoral, unethical and hypocritical. It will surely cause Asians, Europeans, Oceanians, Antarcticans, Africans & S. Americans to laugh at the self-defeating innovation-constipation in North America.

We'll probably be talking about the current state of Desktop Linux, where it is, where it isn't and what's still holding it back. Don will have some really good questions, so I'm as eager as anyone to find out where we are at.

For attendees of the conference I'd like to provide a few suggestions about things to do when you're in New York. There's supposed to be a few inches of snow, so my suggestion is bring your goloshes, Wellies or what have you and plan to walk through the slush if you leave your hotel -- since traffic will be unmerciful.

If weather is milder than expected (more than likely), Plan B would be to find a cozy bar restaraunt and hunker down. (It's been in the high-20s, Farenheit, this week, and should not get much over the mid-30s with the snow, not a lot colder.)

If you're feeling adventurous, there are two events here in town that I would recommend unreservedly: a broadway show that's way better than most, and a portrait exhibition that's unbelievable.

This visually severe, aurally lush reinvention of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth's era-defining musical of marriage and its discontents from 1970 is the chicest-looking production on Broadway.

What we noticed is the musical talent on stage. Remarkable! Let me just say also that Raul Esperanza is excellent (he was great as Caracticus Potts in the (Albert) Broccoli's Broadway production (i.e., James Bond) of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, too).

Expect ticket prices of $45 to $85, and a superb value at that. Box office walk-ups should be no problem.

For background, DA Pennebaker (Monterrey Pop, Bob Dylan's Don't Look Back) filmed a documentary in 1970 after the original Company got its good reviews of the making of the Company original cast recording. It is a typically Cinema Verite' Pennebaker treatment of an 18-hour recording marathon which ends in a cliff-hanger as the stars, Elaine Stritch and Dean Jones, hit the wall in their climactic numbers -- with Sondheim featured as the anxious mid-wife to his own baby.

The title is an understatement. This is the work of Otto Dix, Max Beckman, George Grosz and other painters of the Weimar Republic period between the wars (I and II) when Germany was thrown into social, political & economic chaos after the overthrow of the monarchy at the end of World War I (1919).

Otto Dix, "To Beauty" (1922)

Otto Dix, "Skat Players" (1920)

For me these portraits throw all of the 20th Century into clear focus and answer the question, among others, where did Adolf Hitler really come from.

You'll get in here for something like $12 and the food is good, too, at the Met.